Brighton-Crawley Route

Looking for a bit of local knowledge. Moving to Brighton in May and want to commute to work on my bike. aware of cycle route NCN20 that'll take me but would rather be riding on the road than cycle paths. Is the A23 too hectic to ride all the way from Brighton to Crawley and back? Pretty confident rider but don't wanna take to much of a risk.

Am i better sticking to the nearby A and B roads? ie A273 (Brighton rd, London rd, Isaac Lane) through Burgess Hill then B2036 (London Rd, Balcombe Rd) up through Balcombe into Crawley?

Cheers!

Stay away from the A23!

I would recommend the route through Haywards Heath - Ditchling - Brighton via Moulsecoomb.

It's got a beast of a hill from Ditchling road into Brighton but it's good fun. I've cycled this way on a ride back from London and enjoyed it.

ah right, so skip out the A273, head up Ditchlin Rd instead, up through Wivelsfield on the B2112 (Common Lane) to Haywards Heath then onto the B2036 (London Rd, Balcombe Rd) up through Balcombe into Crawley?

Will be a good old commute with that hill included! Up for a challenge though

There may well be more direct routes and it does involve a hill but It's a nice route which I've done before a couple of times. a 50 mile round trip is more than I'd ever do on a working day though!

yeah just mapped the route on google maps and it turns out to be a bit of a beast! the NCN route is not so bad ~18 miles one way so maybe i'll just have to off road it or include some train travel in it

I've just commuted on the A23 route to Burgess hill, it was fine until I got a f'in puncture 10min before hassocks and finished the journey on the train (how stupid is it to go on a 14 mile journey without some sort of repair equipment! don't do it!)
A guy at work usualy rides the ditchling rd route in the summer I might try that as well.
We should organise a morning commute ride (no, not the bike train...)

something like this is shorter and some nice roads

yup, looks good, for Crawley, I wouldn't bother with the Clayton route either, such a stupid hill.

Rectification, the clayton hill is ok going north but is much harder coming back south.